Atmospheric pollution from vehicular traffic is a matter of growing interest, often leading to temporary restrictions in urban areas. Although guidelines indicate limits for several parameters, the real toxicologic impacts remain largely unexplored in field conditions. In this study our aim was to validate an ecotoxicologic approach to evaluate both bioaccumulation and toxicologic effects cause...

INTRODUCTION The rosy wolfsnail (Euglandina rosea), a predatory land snail, finds prey snails and potential mates by following their mucus trails. Euglandina have evolved unique, mobile lip extensions that detect mucus and aid in following trails. Currently, little is known of the neural substrates of the trail-following behavior. METHODS To investigate the neural correlates of trail followin...

Elevated levels of carbon dioxide increase lung ventilation in Helix aspersa. The hypercapnic response originates from a discrete respiratory chemosensory region in the dorsal subesophageal ganglia that contains CO(2)-sensitive neurons. We tested the hypothesis that pH-dependent inhibition of potassium channels in neurons in this region mediated the chemosensory response to CO(2). Cells isolate...

Sexual selection and sexual conflict have been shown to play key roles in the evolution of species with separate sexes. Experimental evidence is accumulating that this is also true for simultaneous hermaphrodites. For example, many species of land snails forcefully stab their mating partners with love darts. In the brown garden snail (Helix aspersa, now called Cantareus asperses), this dart inc...

As an extension of our studies on the antitumour properties of various hemocyanins, we sought to compare the antiproliferative effects of hemocyanins derived from two snail species: Helix lucorum (HIH) and Helix aspersa (HaH). This is the first report on the antitumour effects of HaH. We hypothesized that HaH has antitumour effects not only against bladder cancer, as previously shown with other...